Introduction: Well, we know some of the rage over the surprise announcement of the nerf to ISU-152, something I've rarely seen anybody constantly asking for. Altough I do not feel any change is needed to this tank, on previous toppics I made and read, even people who were strongly against this nerf had a point about it being slightly broken, so I thought: 'Ok fine, let's try and find a middle ground'.

What is the problem?

Well,

1. What is the problem with ISU for those who want nerfing it? It is the combination between very high alpha(286, second in it's tier) and alpha damage(750 highest per tier along with RHM). They believe this is too OP or broken. And support this nerf because it reduces the penetration to 260(5th or 6th place I belive after the introduction of chineese TDs). One thing that is evident about those people, however, is that they seem to be unable to make up their minds. While the nerf about penetration, they bring up the fact that ISU can 1,2,3,4 or what ever-shot a tank of a certain tier.

2. What is the problem with the update for those that are against it? Well, it is the fact that ISU is not just legendary for this 'Troll Gun', but actually the combo between penetration and alpha is the only good thing this TD has going for it. Speed is decent on paper, but as soon as you have to turn the tank, it is gone. Mobility overall is crap. Camo is nothing to write home about, even the gun itself is not that great considering how innacurate it is, forcing players to aim at the center of mass to have a decent chance of hitting their target, rendering the aiming for weakspots a huge challenge. Armour, well, you ain't going to get more than 150mm at the best from most of the hull, and that is angled. Face to face, even some Tier 4s can penetrate it.

What shall we accept?

People should first accept that ISU is not the only tank in the game that has the same alpha-damage combination tier-for tier. In almost every tier(apart II, III and IX) there at least one tank that has huge alpha and big penetration, Hetzer, T40 for Tier 4, Baththub and Toaster for Tier V, SU-100Y for tier VI, St. Emil for tier 7, FV, JgPz for tier 10 and the list is still open.

Everybody shall accept that ISU is not an artillery, it cannot shoot you behind cover and from across the map. If you complain about driving in the open and getting smaked by it, it is your fault for driving in the open. And in the end, smaking people driving in the open is what TDs are meant to do. You have to accept that it has no armour, so playing it like an assault gun(like FV 183b and JgPz E100 would normally do) is not a day-to-day option. It can be quite rewarding, making you a hero of the game, or it can go horribly wrong, rendering you useless.

You also have to accept that reducing penetration would solve nothing. People are just going to load gold and be as annoying as before. Actually, even more annoying since 'the skill' travels even faster, so less lead required. Lower tanks are still going to get 1,2,3 shotted. The only thing that it is going to achieve is ruining the fun for the people. DPM is quite average compared to other TDs in the same tier, but you have to keep in mind, this is because of the high alpha. If you miss just one shot(Which is going to happen), 25% of your DPM is gone

On the other hand, maybe that alpha and penetration and DPM is just a little bit broken

What to do?

First of all, BL-10 has to stay as the main gun. ISU was historically equiped with BL-10 as a prototype for a more powerfull TD, to replace the 122mm standard soviet gun.

Well, my suggestion is inspired by the tier 6 premium tank destroyer SU-100Y. It is quite similar to the ISU and this is the main reason for it.

Why not give ISU the same special feature: 2 balanced choices for projectiles: 1 with higher penetration and slightly lower damage as standard and 1 with lower penetration, but higher damage as a semi-premium.

The shells for the 2 projectiles:

Standard: 280 pen(yes, even lower than the current one) and 699 alpha(for the OCD out there )

Semi-premium: not as expensive as the current premium shell, with 260 pen and 740 alpha

Maybe, even trade some of the DPM for a little bit better accuracy?

You can also rework HE shells, give them more penetration and a little lower damage.

P.S if you are that certain type of player who goes by the ideea of 'ISU drivers are all ****** tomato bots who camp at the red line and like to snipe like bloody idiots blah,blah, blah, you do not get my point, blah, blah' as their main argument- well, do not bother to be here. We got your point loud and clear since the first one of you posted it.

Alpha damage should change. 750 is ridiculous at tier 8. The pen, is less of an issue. So, if WG want to rebalance the ISU, (and I am all for that, it is not in a good state right now), they should start with the alpha damage.

ISU was historically equiped with BL-10. Yea, and after shot it destroyed a whole tank. Maybe add a 3 shell clip? For historical reasons, maybe stalin wanted to see it as an autoloader and in toilet drawed this idea. Just like all other LSD tanks, such as japanese space ships, 10 maus prototypes, 15 is3 prototypes, and etc.

ISU was historically equiped with BL-10. Yea, and after shot it destroyed a whole tank. Maybe add a 3 shell clip? For historical reasons, maybe stalin wanted to see it as an autoloader and in toilet drawed this idea. Just like all other LSD tanks, such as japanese space ships, 10 maus prototypes, 15 is3 prototypes, and etc.

Difficult to judge the level of vitriol here, but as an FYI, the historical ISU did not have the BL-10.

IMO the issue was the combination of caliber vs pen. Not alpha vs pen. As if you could not overmatch it. You would just auto pen it. And tossing 750 alpha in there just made for a bad mix on tier 8 vs other 750 alpha guns, as the Borsig has 210mm AP pen on a 150mm gun, and not 152mm.

And have you played it on test? It's still feels like the same troll tank when top tier and in +1 games. It's the same gun, it's just a name change so the tier 9 BL-10 is not affected. It aim time is the same, same dispersion, same reload, same alpha, same caliber. Just less pen. And you know most press two vs tier X tanks anyway, even with that gun.

Chinese tier 8 has more pen now indeed. Pushing the ISU from 3th highest to 5th. As the Charioteer went past it to. But none of those have a 152mm AP shell. Chinese is 130mm. The others are 105mm. So the compilation of pen, overmatch and alpha is not equally broken.

tajj7, on 09 August 2017 - 01:31 PM, said:

Should change it to 260 pen with like 600 alpha, then up the gun handling stats and mobility.

750 alpha with 286 AP penetration on tier 8 is broken whatever the rest of the tank is like.

Might as well make it a 130mm then with higher alpha shells to match the new Chinese then, if you want to go that way on alpha that is.

I like my BL10 only thing wrong is it doesn't like me. Moody piece of code, as Wiki describes it. How many times, fully aimed, does it miss or cause a crit, to many. Remember a whiles back full aimed shot on T9 French arty, guess what it bounced

P.S if you are that certain type of player who goes by the ideea of 'ISU drivers are all ****** tomato bots who camp at the red line and like to snipe like bloody idiots blah,blah, blah, you do not get my point, blah, blah' as their main argument- well, do not bother to be here. We got your point loud and clear since the first one of you posted it.

Why should such people not post? Because the people you are referring to who don't consider brainless base camping good for the game and who try to play the game, are your main opposition so their opinion doesn't matter?

Your 'ISU drivers are all ****** tomato bots who camp at the red line and like to snipe like bloody idiots' is a very good way to exactly describe why the tank is aids. The players who want to be useful don't play it because it's not a good vehicle, right now it just attracts people with no skill and no willingness to learn who just want to derp their gun a couple of times from the base circle and get better stats than they deserve.

Oh right, you don't want people like me to post because ISU is your best tier 8 damage dealer and the 2nd best damage dealer of all tanks in your garage(far ahead of such tanks as T-54 and T-10...) and you get 51% win rate with it which is very high for your standards. All this while having 0.26 spots per game and less than 4 shots fired per game. Basically you camp 24/7, never do anything for the team and yet this tank yields you a better performance than much better tanks that require a basic level of situational awareness. This is one of those moments when I'm probably just happy that WG aren't releasing distance travelled per game, because it's probably on par with your spots per game. You're the exact player who reaps the rewards of ISU requiring no skill at all, and after horribly failing with tanks as easy to play as IS-3 you're now worried that your noobtube is getting an insignificant nerf.

P.S if you are that certain type of player who goes by the ideea of 'ISU drivers are all ****** tomato bots who camp at the red line and like to snipe like bloody idiots blah,blah, blah, you do not get my point, blah, blah' as their main argument- well, do not bother to be here. We got your point loud and clear since the first one of you posted it.

Not about a tank category, he is being salty by basically enacting a "preventive middle finger" to anyone else who might share a different opinion or criticize him.

That's salty and it will not bring him glory.

It is not about me not appreciating the opinion of others regarding the subject. I wouldn't have asked people to a discussion and a poll if it was so.

There are some people on ISU dedicated toppics(who came here too) that only bring the argument: "ISU is for camping tomatoes, you are just a useless camping tomato with ***** stats etc. etc. etc.)Those are the people I do not want here. They are only here to insult others who want to save one of their favourite tank or at least make it some justice.

Their only argument is 'you are a noob who camps and shoots one shot per game and that is your only purpose in life, and I know that is true about you because that's how most ISU players I've seen are.". Not only this is insulting to me and others, but it makes no God damn sense. I've seen people in T95 camp and fire only one shot, I've seen people in JgPz E100, in FV183b, in T28 prot etc. etc camp the hell out of a game. They have armour and hitpoints an ISU could only dream of, if those aren't assault guns meant for the front line, I have no ideea which is one, But are those campers a reason for me to insult all the people who own those tanks and enjoy playing it? No. So I do not. I am tired of being insulted by an [edited]who wouldn't even dare to use his real account to post on forums, but trashtalks about my statistics(one of the game aspects I really do not care about)